Smashing Grammar: A guide to improving your writing skills and avoiding common mistakes

by Craig Shrives

'Few people understand Grammar like Craig Shrives. Best of all, no one explains it so well and so easily.' - Chief Executive of Crimestoppers and former Director of the Intelligence Corps, Mark Hallas OBE

Written by a former British Army officer (also the founder of the popular website Grammar Monster), Smashing Grammar is both a go-to grammar guide and a primer for writing clear English.

Smashing Grammar is divided into three sections: A-Z of Punctuation, A-Z of Grammar Essentials and A-Z of Easily Confused Words. Every entry starts with a simple explanation and some basic examples. These are followed by real-life, engaging examples, which have been painstakingly hunted down for their ability to illustrate the point.

Every entry concludes with a 'Why Should I Care?' section offering great tips and advice and explaining why the grammar point matters to a writer. Imbued with 'barrack room' humour, the writing itself is entertaining and often laugh-out-loud funny, with thousands of sample quotations ranging from Groucho Marx and Homer the Simpson to Karl Marx and Homer the Greek.

Genres: Writing

470 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 26, 2019

Reviews

[Mr Ogologo · Rating 4 out of 5]

What I've noticed with reading these books with certain terms is not that I'll remember every single one, but that it will increase my awareness of them and I'll notice them when going forward and be able to implement them into my existing writing style.

For example, I found the tips on conditional and non conditional sentences interesting. I think those little nuances can enable ideas to seep further into a person's mind.
I got an explanation with regards to the verb to use with the head noun which I believe I've always gotten right but never known why. Now I know the rule (the verb must always agree with the noun to the left of the word of NOT immediately to the left of the verb).
Also, the rule with the conjugation of verbs to satisfy the subject-verb agreement with collective nouns. I know a lot of these rules intuitively but it's nice to have a conscious explanation of them in case I need to help someone out or when I'm learning a foreign language.

I will be using this book as a reference book and I thought that the tips offered were very useful to help one refine their writing and tighten up certain errors committed that can trigger the more finicky readers.

[Tarek Aziz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good book for learning english.

[Rochelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

A comprehensive guide to grammar with lots of examples. An invaluable resource for writers.